Gaston Acurio

Meet The New Star Chef Everyone's Talking About

AskMen (AM): La Mar Cebicheria’s setting is fine dining, yet it feels more inclusive and perhaps casual than traditional fine dining, right?Gaston Acurio (GA): The idea of having to be exclusive, as in a French restaurant, is over. You don’t have [to] check at the door if someone has the right amount of money, the right face or clothing to get in. Food is returning to what it should be: sharing, celebrating with family at the table. Refinement, but in a relaxed and cool way that isn’t pretentious or exclusive — that’s the future of fine dining.AM: Tell me about your commitment to sustainable seafood and partnership with Monterey Bay Aquarium.GA: We had to adjust ingredients for La Mar in San Francisco — octopus, tuna, swordfish were all endangered. But we knew customers want this kind of compromise; when they eat out they don’t want to feel that they’re doing harm to species at risk.

Bringing the revolution to america

AM: You opened two years ago in San Francisco, and less than two months ago in New York. Has it been difficult to adapt a Peruvian menu to North America?GA: The menu changes in part based on where we are. In San Francisco, we arrived with five ingredients that we use to create authentic flavors: Peruvian corn, pisco, aji Panca, aji Amarillo, rocoto [hot pepper paste], and Peruvian black beans. So when we arrived, we found local producers and farmers, and some local ingredients to blend with our traditional ones. In New York, we have Maine lobster on the menu. In San Francisco, it’s Dungeness crab and squid from the Gulf. Ingredients change but not the spirit of the menu.

AM: Why open in San Francisco first, before New York or even Miami?GA: Because of the ocean. We were presenting a restaurant called “La Mar” to a huge country like the U.S., so we needed the ocean at the forefront and a base of customers who love to go out for dinner — but to eat, not to be seen. We needed a city that was vibrant with flavors, originality and ingredients, great ethnic food, and that’s San Francisco. And we knew that if we had success there, we’d become stronger to understand the much more difficult city [for restaurant openings] that New York is.

The food revolution's next steps

AM: Where are you opening next?GA: Next year we’ll open La Mar in Miami, and in Barcelona, a restaurant brand we call Tanta, which is Peruvian family-style food. In Lima, we’ll open an amazing new location of Astrid & Gaston, which will have a fine-dining room, an inexpensive gastrobar, and a patio with an organic garden and market stall that has a juice bar and sandwiches for three dollars. The property has a 300-year-old house that we’re converting into a cultural center for free daily cooking demonstrations, so everybody regardless of income could feel part of the restaurant.AM: What’s your favorite place to take your wife, Astrid, for a special occasion, such as a wedding anniversary?GA: Our anniversary is in springtime in Peru, so it becomes sunny. I like to go to a traditional cebicheria called Sonia. She's the wife of a fisherman, who’s gone out in a small boat the last 50 years, and Sonia cooks whatever he catches that day. Last time, we had traditional cebiche, tuna prosciutto called mojama, fried Dover sole roe, then she just did a whole Dover sole fried with crispy garlic. And the best part was that they have these old musicians — friends from childhood who are now about 80 years old — who create an amazing ambiance. With sunshine, fresh fish of the day, old-time music, it’s the best party in the world.AM: Do you keep in touch with Ferran Adrià these days?GA: I opened a gastrobar in Madrid, but one of the reasons I’m opening Tanta in Barcelona is because Ferran is a very close friend — we have a lot of projects to share, social projects for the future — and Barcelona is just a great place to eat.AM: What about San Francisco’s celebrity Chef Michael Mina?GA: I met him at [one of his restaurants] Bourbon Steakhouse — he was there recently when I went, and he invited me to [eponymous restaurant] Michael Mina, but I didn’t have time to try it. I’d love to go next time I’m in town.

The perfect restaurant for a date

AM: What’s the perfect date-night meal?GA: I’d take her to a Nikkei place, which is Peruvian Japanese food. These restaurants are developing a new Peruvian kind of sushi, made with vegetables, meats of all kinds and chicken — not only fish but everything you want. Cold, hot, raw, cooked, with lots of Peruvian chiles. There’s one Lima restaurant called Maido that’s light, bright, colorful, fun — I’d definitely take a girl there.